Category: News

Government From A Bunker

Closing Thought–02Jun20

By now I am sure that most intelligent people have heard that Trump was rushed to a bunker for his safety on Friday.

Secret Service agents rushed President Trump to a White House bunker on Friday night as hundreds of protesters gathered outside the executive mansion, some of them throwing rocks and tugging at police barricades, the AP reports. Trump spent nearly an hour in the underground shelter, which was designed for use in emergencies like terrorist attacks, according to a Republican close to the White House who was not authorized to publicly discuss private matters and spoke on condition of anonymity. The account was confirmed by an administration official who also spoke on condition of anonymity. The abrupt decision by the agents underscored the rattled mood inside the White House, where the chants from protesters in Lafayette Park could be heard all weekend and Secret Service agents and law enforcement officers struggled to contain the crowds.

Friday’s protests were triggered by the death of George Floyd, a black man who died after he was pinned at the neck by a white Minneapolis police officer. The demonstrations in Washington turned violent and appeared to catch officers by surprise. They sparked one of the highest alerts on the White House complex since the Sept. 11 attacks in 2001. The president and his family have been shaken by the size and venom of the crowds, according to the Republican. Trump traveled to Florida on Saturday to view the first manned space launch from the US in nearly a decade. He returned to a White House under virtual siege, with protesters—some violent—gathered just a few hundred yards away through much of the night. Demonstrators returned Sunday afternoon, facing off against police at Lafayette Park into the evening.

Here is a closing thought for the day…..all those “other” leaders that were fond of bunkers….

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And now for the latest…..

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A real leader would have tried to see what the noise was about….instead this fool runs to his underground bunker like the coward he is.

Remember his church fiasco?

Well the police forced a priest away from the church that Trump used in his photo op….

Early Monday evening (June 1), President Donald Trump stood before the historic St. John’s Episcopal Church in downtown Washington and held aloft a Bible for cameras.

The photo opportunity had an eerie quality: Trump said relatively little, positioned stoically in front of the boarded-up church, which had been damaged the day before in a fire during protests sparked by the death of George Floyd on May 25 in Minneapolis.

The church appeared to be completely abandoned.

It was, in fact, abandoned, but not by choice: Less than an hour before Trump’s arrival, armored police used tear gas to clear hundreds of peaceful demonstrators from Lafayette Square park, which is across the street from the church.

Authorities also expelled at least one Episcopal priest and a seminarian from the church’s patio.

Ahead of Trump Bible photo op, police forcibly expel priest from St. John’s church near White House

This is pathetic and yet he still has his supporters among the religious….that is also pathetic.

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

Good News For South Mississippi

Our area has not been the hot spot for the Covid-19 but we have had many cases and deaths….but yesterday we got some good news….

Live updates June 1: New COVID-19 cases in Harrison County, no Coast deaths for 5 days

Total cases for South Mississippi are:

George — 25 (0 new cases for three days)

Hancock — 91 (0 new cases for two days)

Harrison — 261 (3 new cases)

Jackson — 307 (1 fewer cases)

Pearl River — 209 (0 new cases for three days)

Let’s hope we are as lucky for longer.
 
Be Well….Be Safe….Be Careful…..
 
“lego ergo scribo”

Trying To Season With The Hurricane Season–2020

Closing Though–01Jun20

Every year on 01 June, the start of the hurricane season I post info that will help others understand what and why we along Hurricane Alley look at religiously…..and the scary or worrisome thing is there have already been 2 named storms before the season begins.

Let me say here that hurricane preparedness has taught us living in Hurricane Alley how to deal with the pandemic…..we know prep.

Onto the new season…..

Looks like hurricanes have been changed……and not for the better…..

Are hurricanes getting worse? That’s what climate models have long predicted, and now there’s evidence: A new study finds that hurricanes have indeed grown more powerful in recent decades, LiveScience reports. “The trend is there and it is real,” lead study author James Kossin tells the New York Times. “There’s this remarkable building of this body of evidence that we’re making these storms more deleterious.” Worldwide satellite images between 1979 and 2017 show a roughly 15% increase in hurricanes hitting 100 knots, especially in the last 19 years of the time frame, per the study. The chance of a hurricane being Category 3 or worse has also risen about 8% every 10 years.

This echoes the notion that warmer water, which fuels hurricanes, is making them bigger and stronger. But greenhouse gases may not be the only cause. Scientists also point to changing sea surface temperatures in the North Atlantic, perhaps due to natural variability or lower sulfur emissions in fossil-fuel burning. That said, Kossin mostly agrees with the climate-change angle: “Global warming has made hurricanes stronger, but our results don’t tell us precisely how much of the trends are caused by human activities and how much may be just natural variability,” he says in a press release.

Without further distractions…..

The 2020 Atlantic hurricane season is predicted to be more active than usual, according to an outlook released Thursday by The Weather Company, an IBM Business.

The outlook created by Dr. Todd Crawford, chief meteorologist at The Weather Company, calls for 18 named storms, nine hurricanes and four major hurricanes – one that is Category 3 or higher (115-plus-mph winds) on the Saffir-Simpson Hurricane Wind Scale.

This forecast is significantly above the 30-year (1981-2010) normalized average of 13 named storms, seven hurricanes and three major hurricanes.

A little historical perspective……https://weather.com/storms/hurricane/news/2020-04-15-atlantic-hurricane-season-april-outlook-the-weather-company-ibm

In this year of the pandemic there is more to worry about than a few storms along the Gulf Coast…..with the pandemic and then a major storm on top of the virus we could be looking at stuff for the movies……

Pete Gaynor, who runs the Federal Emergency Management Agency, is drafting a document whose title sounds like the stuff of horror movies: “COVID-19 Pandemic Operational Guidance for the 2020 Hurricane Season.”

Driving the news: “We’re doing a lot of things that are not necessarily in any playbook that has existed,” Gaynor told me in an interview on Saturday. “In some cases, we write the playbook as we go.”

https://www.axios.com/fema-coronavirus-hurricane-season-ef660cda-f4b3-4002-b8ac-71438c8edebd.html

The local news reporting on the possible change in hurricane protocols during the pandemic….

The Red Cross and Mississippi Emergency Managament Agency are working together to tackle a huge problem: How do they staff and operate shelters in a post-COVID-19 world? With an active hurricane season being projected, the agencies are working fast to find solutions.

County emergency management agencies and MEMA determine when shelters in Mississippi open. However, it is the Red Cross that staffs the shelters and provides supplies, but COVID-19 could threaten the status quo.

“That’s the kink in it, is that, if a hurricane hit right now, we would not staff any shelters due to the COVID crisis,” said Executive Director John McFarland of the Red Cross’ Southeast Mississippi chapter. “If we were to open the shelter and put people in there and provide sufficient spacing, which would obviously mean putting fewer people in, one person shows symptoms and you have to quarantine the whole shelter and you just make matters worse.”

https://www.wdam.com/2020/05/27/hurricane-protocols-could-be-changing-post-covid-world/

As with the tradition of IST I would like to ring in the 2020 Hurricane Season with Jimmy Buffet…..

One final note….if I am out of touch for awhile then a storm took out our internet and please bear with me….I shall return as soon as I can.

What did the hurricane say to the coconut palm?

Hang on to your nuts for this is no ordinary blow job.

Please add this pdf to your preparedness…..

Click to access 39779_MEMA-Hurrican-Preparedness.pdf

Be well….Be safe…..

“lego ergo scribo”

Those Violent Protesters

AG Barr stepped up and blamed most of the violence in the streets on Antifa Movement….about now most Americans will be asking….what the Hell is Antifa?

I have your answer…..https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/articles/X56rQkDgd0qqB7R68t6t7C/seven-things-you-need-to-know-about-antifa

Or if that was not enough…..https://www.firstpost.com/world/antifa-explained-all-you-need-to-know-about-the-movement-donald-trump-wants-to-declare-a-terrorist-organisation-8432291.html

He as “Ball Boy” for Donald the Orange has stepped up to help make the protests political…..

As officials warned that extremist groups may have infiltrated the protests over George Floyd’s death, President Trump on Sunday asserted that the US would declare antifa a terrorist group. “The United States of America will be designating ANTIFA as a Terrorist Organization,” he tweeted, after days of tweets about “LAW & ORDER!” and “ANARCHISTS” and the need to use the “unlimited power of our Military.” The New York Times notes Trump has no clear authority to actually do that, seeing as antifa, which stands for anti-fascist, is not an organization but “a diffuse movement of left-wing protesters.” Even if it were an organization, there is no law granting the federal government authority to declare a domestic group a terrorist organization; it can only do so for foreign entities. (Politico has more on the ins and outs of this.) After Trump’s tweet, Attorney General William Barr said the FBI would partner with state and local police to identify domestic terrorists who are instigating riots.

The AP reports that federal officials and experts who track extremist groups have both warned that far-left and far-right groups appear to be at work “stoking violence” amid otherwise peaceful protests, and that foreign agents might be behind a disinformation campaign on social media aimed at increasing political tensions. One expert explains to the Washington Post that while the role of outside groups is likely being exaggerated by the administration, it is true that some people simply use situations like this as an excuse to loot stores while others infiltrate the protests in order to turn them violent and thus discredit them. That’s what some Minnesota officials think is happening, warning, per CNN, that white supremacist “agitators” appear to be attending protests in the state. But one expert says she sees evidence of groups hoping to start a second civil war: “They want to co-opt [the protests] in order to start their war. They see themselves as being on the side of protesters and that the protesters themselves are useful in causing anarchy.”

But you know how pathetic this action is…..why?

Department of Safety Commissioner John Harrington said they are contact-tracing the arrested and added that an investigation is underway about white nationalist groups posting online to encourage their members to use the protests as a cover to create chaos.

He said some of the 40 arrests made in the Twin Cities Friday night were of people linked to white supremacist groups and organized crime.

“The people that are doing this are not Minneapolis residents,” Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey said. “They are coming largely from outside the city outside the region to prey on everything we have built.”

Minnesota Officials Link Arrested Looters to ‘White Supremacist’ Groups

For more on this occurrence….

Far-Right Infiltrators and Agitators in George Floyd Protests: Indicators of White Supremacists

And another source…..

White Supremacist Groups Have Been Urging Members To Loot Businesses In Minnesota

Quick to blame anti-fascist while the Nazis in this country get a pass on blame…..why is that?

For those interesting in the Antifa Movement …….

Click to access Antifa,%20The%20Anti-Fascist%20Handbook.pdf

I know why….do you?

Be Informed…..Be Safe…..Be Careful…..

I Read, I Write, You Know

“Lego ergo scribo”

Protests–Week 2

The death of George Floyd has re-ignited the racial tensions that have been smoldering under the radar……and protests have broken out coast to coast……

Tense protests over the death of George Floyd and other police killings of black men grew Saturday from New York to Tulsa to Los Angeles, with police cars set ablaze and reports of injuries mounting on all sides during another night of unrest after months of coronavirus lockdowns. The protests, which began in Minneapolis following Floyd’s death Monday after a police officer pressed a knee on his neck for more than eight minutes, have left parts of the city a grid of broken windows, burned-out buildings, and ransacked stores, the AP reports. The unrest has since become a national phenomenon as protesters decry years of deaths at police hands. More:

  • In Philadelphia, at least 13 officers were injured when peaceful protests turned violent and at least four police vehicles were set on fire. Other fires were set throughout downtown.
  • In the Greenwood District of Tulsa, Oklahoma, the site of a 1921 massacre of black people that left as many as 300 dead and the city’s thriving black district in ruins, protesters blocked intersections and chanted the name of Terence Crutcher, a black man killed by a police officer in 2016.
  • In Tallahassee, Florida, a pickup truck drove through a crowd of protesters, sending some running and screaming as the vehicle stopped and started and at one point had a person on its hood, police said, but no serious injuries were reported. Police handcuffed the driver but did not release his name or say whether he would face charges.
  • In Los Angeles, protesters chanted “Black Lives Matter,” some within inches of the face shields of officers. Police used batons to move the crowd back and fired rubber bullets. One man used a skateboard to try to break a police SUV’s windshield. A spray-painted police car burned in the street.
  • In Washington, DC, growing crowds outside the White House chanted, taunted Secret Service agents and other law enforcement officers, and at times pushed against security barriers. President Trump, who spent much of Saturday in Florida for the SpaceX rocket launch, landed on the residence’s lawn in the presidential helicopter at dusk and went inside with speaking to journalists.
  • In New York City, video posted to social media showed officers using batons and shoving protesters down as they made arrests and cleared streets. Another video showed two NYPD cruisers driving into protesters who were pushing a barricade against a police car and pelting it with objects, knocking several to the ground.
  • In Minneapolis,state troopers and National Guard members moved in to break up protests after an 8pm curfew took effect, firing tear gas and rubber bullets to clear streets outside a police precinct and elsewhere. The show of force came after three days where police mostly declined to engage with protesters. It also came after the state poured in more than 4,000 National Guard members and said the number would soon rise to nearly 11,000.

Donald the Orange in true authoritarian fashion has issued warnings to the public……

Donald Trump has threatened people protesting the death of George Floyd with “vicious dogs” and “ominous weapons” if they had breached the fence outside the White House, where members of the US Secret Service are “waiting for action”.

In a Twitter thread posted after another night of protests and uprisings against police brutality across the US, the president suggested that US Secret Service members look forward to inflicting violence.

He also appeared to encourage counter protests, promoting “MAGA NIGHT AT THE WHITE HOUSE”.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/trump-twitter-george-floyd-death-protests-white-house-dogs-guns-a9540216.html

Then Donald is just begging for another Kent State (look it up!)

President Donald Trump’s controversial statement suggesting looters in Minneapolis, Minnesota, will be shot by National Guard troops drew fire from critics, particularly from congressional leaders with previous battlefield experience.

https://www.businessinsider.com/trump-national-guard-troops-may-shoot-looters-2020-5

Then the Orange one goes to his sycophant in the DoD……

the AP reports that the Pentagon has taken the “rare step” of telling the US Army to deploy active-duty US military police units in Minneapolis. Sources say that includes soldiers from Fort Bragg in North Carolina, Fort Drum in New York, Fort Carson in Colorado, and Fort Riley in Kansas. The orders were given verbally Friday after President Trump sought military options from Defense Secretary Mark Esper to curb the protests in Minneapolis.

Seriously?

It gets more like the authoritarian regimes he, Donald, so admires…..

How long before another “accidental” death happens within these protests?

Finally as long as we are talking about this authoritarian regime in the White House…..

A new study, however, suggests that the main threat to our democracy may not be the hardening of political ideology, but rather the hardening of one particular political ideology. Political scientists Steven V. Miller of Clemson and Nicholas T. Davis of Texas A&M have released a working paper titled “White Outgroup Intolerance and Declining Support for American Democracy.” Their study finds a correlation between white American’s intolerance, and support for authoritarian rule. In other words, when intolerant white people fear democracy may benefit marginalized people, they abandon their commitment to democracy.

https://www.nbcnews.com/think/opinion/trump-effect-new-study-connects-white-american-intolerance-support-authoritarianism-ncna877886

The future is anything but rosy……

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

Sunday News

In case you are totally weary of the virus news and would like to learn something that does not relate to Covid-19 then IST is your logical choice on the weekends.

A warm Sunday here in the South…..rains have flooded a lot but it will soon be over…..now on to the news……

It is official now….the Space Force has its first recruitment ad…..

https://youtu.be/GWGOZ1jtNP0
 
Just in time for the new Space Force……a new comedy on Netflix by the same name……
 
Netflix is about to skew one of the newest bits of cultural phenomenon that’s arrived in the last few years: the US government’s Space Force initiative. Ever since the current administration announced in 2019 that it was investing in Space Force, there have been plenty of jokes at its expense. Netflix’s Space Force series is looking to give all that mockery a nice home, with a strong comedic ensemble led by Steve Carell. But is Space Force really going to be the next Office, Parks and Rec, and/or Veep? The Space Force score on Rotten Tomatoes is out, and it may reveal that very answer!
 
Speaking of space……the US is basically selling the Moon….

The accords seek to establish ‘safety zones’ that would surround future moon bases to prevent what the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration called “harmful interference” from rival countries or companies operating in close proximity.

They would also permit companies to own the lunar resources they mine, a crucial element in allowing NASA contractors to convert the moon’s water ice for rocket fuel or mine lunar minerals to construct landing pads.

The accords are a key part of NASA’s effort to court allies around its plan to build a long-term presence on the lunar surface under its Artemis moon program.

 
More Moon stuff…..when we finally establish we own the Moon…..the most precious element may well be….human urine…..

As humanity pushes to settle the Moon, we’ll need to find ways to quickly build shelters and replenish the water supply. As it turns out, the solution to those life-and-death challenges may lie — well, within.

When it comes to fulfilling humanity’s base needs — food, water, and shelter — on the Moon, the European Space Agency (ESA) thinks that the secret ingredient could be human urine, Wired reports. According to ESA research, it could serve as a crucial component of the best building material available to lunar settlers.

https://futurism.com/the-byte/moon-real-gold-human-urine

One final space thought….the “Heavenly Palace”……the Chinese want to go into competition with the West on Space stuff…..

China has laid out an ultra-ambitious timeline to construct its “Heavenly Palace” space station — a plan that involves launch 11 missions before 2023, SpaceNews reports, to construct an orbital three-module lab.

The first piece to be launched into space is a massive, 20-ton core module that will eventually serve as astronaut quarters. China is hoping to launch the module as early as 2021, according to SpaceNews.

https://futurism.com/the-byte/chinas-heavenly-palace-space-station-dazzling

Move on….shall we?

I am a dog person…..and my buddy MoMo has a great nose and that got me thinking about a story I read the other day…..a story about Indiana Bones…..

n a sunny summer day in Croatia several years ago, an archaeologist and two dog handlers watched as two dogs, one after another, slowly worked their way across the rocky top of a wind-scoured ridge overlooking the Adriatic Sea.

Bodies had lain in beehive-shaped tombs on this necropolis, part of the prehistoric hill fort of Drvisica, since the Iron Age. The two dogs, trained to detect human remains, were searching for scents that were thousands of years old.

Panda, a Belgian Malinois with a “sensitive nose”, according to her handler, Andrea Pintar, had begun exploring the circular leftovers of a tomb when she suddenly froze, her nose pointed towards a stone burial chest. This was her signal that she had located the scent of human remains.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/dog-archaeology-ancient-human-remains-bones-croatia-a9522776.html

The South is about to get a lot more noisy than normal…..

Some communities in the U.S. are about to get yet another surprise from what is shaping up to be a way-too-eventful 2020: Millions of cicadas making their comeback after 17 years underground. Sure, they may not be as menacing as as the giant murder hornets. But the large, winged-insects with giant bulbous eyes will definitely make their presence known with what Virginia Tech describes as their pronounced “cacophonous whining.” “Communities and farms with large numbers of cicadas emerging at once may have a substantial noise issue,” Eric Day, Virginia Cooperative Extension entomologist in Virginia Tech’s Department of Entomology, said in a news release. Up to 1.5 million cicadas per acre are expected to emerge in Southwest Virginia, West Virginia, and parts of North Carolina this summer, according to Virginia Tech. 

https://www.thedailybeast.com/millions-of-cicadas-are-about-to-emerge-after-17-year-slumber

Now in closing I have found the idea of the decade…..Fur Oil.

What is Fur Oil?

Good Question…..

Fur Oil has become a game-changer in beauty for targeting a long-forgotten part of our bodies: pubic hair. Instead of promoting hair removal, the brand praises proper care and maintenance of our bodies’ natural pubic hair growth via their rich, luxurious oil that’s meant to soften and nourish your hair “down there.”

We have haircare and skincare routines, but what about pube-care? Whether you’re fully waxed, trimmed, or au naturale with your pubic hair, you understand the hairy situations that come with maintaining your nether regions: ingrown hairs, itchiness, and a brittle feel, just to name a few.

So, if you haven’t already, it’s time to give your pubes some TLC!

No, we’re not talking about Kourtney Kardashian’s old-school mayonnaise trick — but don’t yuck someone else’s yum, guys. We’re talking about the cult-favorite Fur Oil, a soothing hair oil that’s made specifically for your pubic area in mind, but can also be used on any area of your body that sprouts hair (eyebrows, armpits, legs, you name it!).

https://www.bestproducts.com/beauty/a32478910/fur-oil-review/

Yesterday I found a great deal on fresh corn……13 ears for $1.56….and I went to the grill….

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This will feed the two of us for a couple of days…..grilled corn…….yummy.

Be well….Be Safe…….

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

Billie Eilish On Protests

I have been saying every time some protest breaks out that it ain’t over until a solution to the problems are found…..my words have been falling on deaf ears so when I saw this young performer let the words fly I was taken aback…..her words are marvelous……

As protests and violence continue to spread across numerous American cities in the aftermath of George Floyd’s death, Billie Eilish wrote an impassioned statement on Instagram to condemn white people who aren’t willing to engage with the Black Lives Matter movement. Or rather, people who don’t want to escape their White Lives Matter mindset. “I’ve been trying to take this week to figure out a way to address this delicately. I have an enormous platform and I try really hard to be respectful and take time to think through what I say and how I say it, but holy fucking shit I’m just gonna start talking,” Eilish wrote in all-caps. “If I hear one more white person say ‘All Lives Matter’ one more fucking time I’m gonna lose my fucking mind. Will you shut the fuck up? No one is saying your life doesn’t matter. No one is saying your life is not hard. No one is saying literally anything at all about you. All you [motherfuckers] do is find a way to make everything about yourself. This is not about you. Stop making everything about you. You are not in need. You are not in danger.”

(there is so much more….read more)……

https://www.vulture.com/2020/05/billie-eildeath.ish-instagram-on-george-floyd-and-all-lives-matter.html

Well said Billie!

These protesters are making the news about the violence and destruction and not about the issue of the death…..the MSM looks for chaos that they can analyze ad nauseum and seldom touch on the death/s….

I still wait for the real conversation on race in this country……so far we have NOT touched on the issue….we have analyzed it to death (no pun intended) and still it is a reoccurring problem.

Where does this end?

Well it does not….until the race question is addressed.

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”